I always get a lot of question asking how someone becomes a trader. The truth is that there is no simple answer, it is a combination of education, ability, personality, drive & luck. I’ll quickly go over them below:  

Education

At a minimum a University Bachelor in Commerce/Economics and preferably some industry courses. All the large institutions recruit at the major Universities in September for positions beginning after graduation in June/Aug. There are usually two types of positions, Analyst & Associate. Analyst is for Undergrads and Associates for MBAs.  Read more

I wish this wasn’t true. I wish there was a nicer way of saying this. Alas, there is not.

Canadian consumers are suckers, willing to buy at any price.

How else can one explain the record quarter for new auto sales during the first quarter of 2008. Sales that had their biggest increase since 1998. That’s a freaking decade, people!

Sales of new passenger cars were up 17.8%, the largest increase since 1976.  That’s more than three freaking decades!

I don’t get it.

Canadian cars are expensive. No, that’s too nice, they’re a rip-off. Auto manufacturers are scamming the Canadians and they seem more than happy to go along with it.

How else can one explain these sales numbers?

The Canadian dollar has been near or above par with the US for over a year. Yet Canadian car prices are still more than 10, 20, even 30 percent more expensive than identical models south of the border. The only leverage Canadian consumers have to reduce this discrepancy is to buy used cars, or simply not buy at all.

However, going out like lemmings and buying new cars just because the dealer’s marketing campaign uses slogans like “Canadian Pricing” while giving you a 3% discount on price is just stupid.

Boo on you Canada, Boo on you.

With all the recent negative press on the economy, I’ll forgive you for not noticing that the Dow Industrial Average had a really good month in April. Super Really Good. 4.6% returns good.

May is not doing too shabby either. Two days into the month and the Dow is up 1.4%. Aren’t we supposed to be in the middle of a Bear Market with a looming recession? What gives??!?!

What gives is that prior to April, the market went down too much, too quickly, thereby attracting buyers. From October 1st to March 31st, the Dow tumbled almost 13%. That’s quite a haircut for a 6 month period. Based on where we are today, the market still needs another 8.3% in gains just to break even with October’s numbers.

So here’s the big question: Is this just a blip correction, or do we call out the bulls and shout recovery?

 Lets take a look at what we know based on data from the last few weeks:

- The US Federal Reserve has been slashing rates. This usually leads to a boost to stocks, as companies will be able to borrow for less, and consumer get access to cheaper money (so that they can spend it).

- Job numbers for the month of April weren’t as bad as expected. The results were a quarter of the street consensus.

- GDP also topped analysts expectations in April.

- Oil & Food prices continued to rise rapidly, with no real end in sight.

So overall there’s been more positive than negative economic news this past month. However, and this is a BIG however, the continued rise in oil and food prices can lead to high inflation, which can undo a lot of the positives from the past month.

The good news is that things aren’t so bad after all, but we’re not out of the woods yet.

Apple released the following earnings summary:

“APPLE REPORTS RECORD SECOND QUARTER RESULTS
APPLE INTERNATIONAL CO LTD   Q2 SHR $1.16
SEES Q3 2008 SHR ABOUT $1.00
Q2 REVENUE $7.51 BLN
SEES Q3 2008 REVENUE ABOUT $7.2 BLN
SAYS QUARTERLY IPHONE(TM) SALES WERE 1,703,000
SAYS APPLE SHIPPED 2,289,000 MACINTOSH COMPUTERS DURING THE QUARTER
SAYS SOLD 10,644,000 IPODS DURING THE QUARTER”

This info was pulled from the news release off the wire service, sorry for the weird format.

It should be noted that Apple’s shares slipped about 1% during after hours trading. Apparently, their projections for the upcoming third quarter were a bit lower than expected.